


Desiderata

by EllieL



Category: House M.D.
Genre: Angst, Episode: s03e09 Finding Judas, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-11
Updated: 2006-12-11
Packaged: 2019-09-17 16:39:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16978185
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EllieL/pseuds/EllieL
Summary: He shakes his head, disappointed in himself, in his inability to apologize properly to the person who most deserves it. Apologies are not something he has much practice with, but she’s one of the few people who merit one.





	Desiderata

****  
  
He sinks a little lower in the bath, hoping the hot water and Epsom salts will ease the aches out of his joints, his soul. There’s a Heineken wedged into the wire soapdish, half-empty, the low alcohol content nowhere near to relaxing the angry pains of his body. He wants hard liquor, at least, or narcotics, but the bottle of Jack didn’t fit in the basket, and Cuddy didn’t give him any more pills.  
  
It wasn’t as if he could go ask her for more, not after what he’d said to her. Even as the words were escaping his lips, he knew it was wrong, but the withdrawal was screaming, and it yelled at her before he could help it. It had been all he could do to face her later to treat the little girl, and even there it hadn’t been worth it, because he’d been wrong. Wrong.  
  
Chase had been right, and all he’d gotten for his efforts were a slug in the face and the knowledge that a little girl still had all her limbs. Chase could take comfort in that, but Cuddy had nothing to cushion the blow he’d struck with his words, a far harder blow than the one he’d dealt his fellow.  
  
His body protests as he reaches over the edge of the tub, long fingers skimming over the tile floor before catching the hem of his jeans, dragging them toward the tub and extracting his cell phone from the pocket. He can’t go without the pills, would rather face her than the pain and nausea and conscience.  
  
The phone rings three times before she answers, a torturous eternity, because he knows she has caller ID and isn’t be happy with him right now. When she finally picks up, her greeting is terse.  
  
“Cuddy, I need you to bring me more pills. I didn’t get any before I left and it’s been—“ he tries to do the math and can’t, can’t focus on anything but the need for the pills to deaden everything he’s feeling right now.  
  
She doesn’t give him the chance to finish his calculations. Sighing, weary as if he’s finally broken her and she can’t help but do this, she tells him she’ll be there in twenty minutes.   
  
He runs more hot water into the tub after tossing the phone onto the tile with a sharp crack, letting the heat ease what little it can as he swigs deeply from the beer. It’s not enough, and he’s glad there’s no clock in his bathroom to tick away each second of agony.  
  
Head leaned against the back of the tub, he may have blacked out, chooses not to think too much about it, as he opens his eyes to see her there, watching him. He’d never seen her look worse, not even last month when she’d called him after the miscarriage and he’d found her curled in her bed, pale and tearstained. Now, she should look comfortable in jeans and a black turtleneck sweater, but her face is sharp and drawn with red eyes skirted by dark circles, emphasized by the way her hair’s pulled back in a sloppy ponytail. There’s a slouch and vulnerability to her posture, too, utterly unlike her. He doesn’t want to have broken her this way.  
  
She crosses the bathroom, sneakers squeaking on tile, closing the toilet to sit down. Carefully, she places a small orange bottle on the sink. “There are six pills in there. That should get you through tonight. We need to talk about getting you on something else, because this isn’t working.”  
  
This isn’t the way he wants her while he’s naked in the water, all business and avoiding his eye. As his brain’s processing this thought, his tongue, too quick, asks, “You couldn’t have brought a little cleavage along to make me feel better?”  
  
Then she does meet his eyes with a cold glare. “At this point, you’re lucky I’m here at all. You may never see my cleavage again, except in your memory.”  
  
“You don’t want to get in here with me, let the warm water soothe all your aches and pains?”  
  
“A hot bath isn’t going to fix what’s causing me pain,” she looks at him pointedly, but he can see the blame and sorrow lurking just behind her eyes.  
  
“It would make me feel better,” he says, leering, but reaching a trembling hand out to her.  
  
With a dismissive snort, she shakes her head, eyes locked on his shaking hand. “Unbelievable. There’s no way you’re up to that now, and you’re doing worse than I thought if you think I’d agree to that now.”  
  
“Will you bring me a pill?” he begs, and is relieved when she assents, shaking one out of the bottle and handing it to him. He catches her hand as he takes it, pulling her to the edge of the tub, playing with her fingers. Swallowing the pill, he savors the knowledge of coming relief for just a moment. “Maybe it wouldn’t make me feel better for the reason you think it would. Maybe my reason is about making you feel better.”  
  
Cuddy stares down at him for a very long time, hurt and uncertainty warring with other, deeper, things he can’t think about right now. “Okay,” she whispers eventually, reaching for the hem of her sweater.  
  
He drops her hand and watches as she slowly undresses. It’s hesitant and so unlike the erotic way she normally sheds her clothes in front of him that he’s mesmerized. She’s not embarrassed by her nudity, just unsure she wants to be naked in front of him, and he sees the bracing breath she takes before climbing into the water with him. She does it warily, like a trapped animal, shifting to the far end, facing him but looking down at her hands curled around her knees.  
  
“C’mere.” He hooks one arm around hers and tugs a few times, until she relents and sloshes towards him, coming to rest with her back against his chest. His hands steady just a bit as he runs them up her arms, pulls her back against him.  
  
She’s careful to stay away from his thigh, rest her head on his left shoulder. He can feel the tension in her, ready to leap up and flee at any moment, especially as his hand comes to rest on the delicate swoop of her clavicle, skims down her body, hotter than the water, to rest over her abdomen. Then he sees her knuckles whiten as she grips the side of the tub, preparing to leave.  
  
“I know it doesn’t fix anything, but I know what I said was out of line. I knew it while I was saying it, and I still said it. I couldn’t help it.” He shakes his head, disappointed in himself, in his inability to apologize properly to the person who most deserves it. Apologies are not something he has much practice with, but she’s one of the few people who merit one.  
  
It’s quiet for a while, but he can feel the tension level ratchet down a bit, so he waits, hand splayed against her. “I know you well enough to expect the little digs every day, at my wardrobe and my administrative and medical capabilities, and I can handle that. I expect it, and some sick part of me would miss it if you stopped. What you said was so far removed from that I don’t know how to handle it. I know where it was coming from, but you were so casually vicious…” she trails off, and he can feel the hitch of her diaphragm and knows she’s crying again. Her chin drops down onto her chest, shaking and brushing her hair against his shoulder.  
  
He turns his head and kisses her temple, brings his hand up and wraps his arms around her. Too often lately he’s held her while she cries, and it’s not something he enjoys, especially not now, when it only reinforces what a bastard he was. “It wasn’t true, you know. You were making the best decisions you could, and you probably saved her life pulling her into that shower with you.”  
  
“But I didn’t listen to you, didn’t make the hard choices to save her, and I couldn’t even reassure her about the choices I did make. That’s what hurt the most.” Her voice was barely a whisper, trailing off on the last sentence.  
  
“She was a patient, not your child. You did the best you could for her. If you’d listened to me, things would have been even worse. You did the right thing.” And she had been. He hated admitting he’d been wrong, but she was the one who deserved to hear it, who needed to hear it. Thinking back, he wasn’t sure he’d ever told her she’d been right, though he’d also admit that his brain wasn’t functioning particularly well now.  
  
One of her hands floated down through the water and caught his, small strong fingers steady on his. She wasn’t ready to voice forgiveness over this, he understood, but recognized that she would eventually. “You should get out of here.”  
  
Sighing, he leaned back. “Help me?”  
  
Rising up like Venus, she stepped carefully from the tub then turned back to him, water shimmering on her skin. Her grip was firm as he took her steadying hand. She’d helped him before, knew how to handle him, aiding him and passing him a towel in a graceful way that left the process intimately erotic rather than something embarrassing. As he dried off, she slipped into his t-shirt and went to find him pajamas.  
  
“You do an amazing job of mothering me when I need it,” he says, taking the soft cotton from her.  
  
She embraces him lightly before letting him lean on her to make his way to the bed, absolution in her gesture. Settling him into bed, she brushes a hand through his damp hair and looks down at him. “Do you need another pill?”  
  
“Please,” he groans, collapsing back into the comfortable nest of bedding.  
  
She brings him two, and a glass of water, handing them over before slipping under the covers beside him. “We need to find you something else,” she said, after he’d swallowed the pills, washing them down with a gulp of water and falling back to wait on relief.  
  
“I don’t know what to do,” he admitted quietly, not looking at her. He’d considered asking for a variety of other medications, had done research on dosages and side effects, but had never followed through. The Vicodin worked, as long as he kept taking more of it, and he was terrified that something else wouldn’t. Here, in the dark, warm, quiet as she lay softly beside him, it was less frightening to admit.  
  
One of her fingers trailed across his cheek, slipped down his neck. “I’ve been thinking about Flexaril or Neurontin. Maybe a combination of the two.”  
  
He reached out and pulled her close by his side, whispering into her curls. “I looked into them both, but I was just…. Let’s try it. Anything’s got to be better than this. I can’t go on like this.”  
  
“I’ll write you a script tomorrow. We’ll have to play with the dosages for a while, figure out what works, if it works.”  
  
A shiver ran through him, in spite of the blankets and her warmth and the Vicodin beginning to course through his system. His body had what it wanted, but not enough of it. Cuddy had started to pull away from him, but at the shudder, she settled back in beside him.  
  
“Try and get some sleep while you can,” she said, whisper warm against his ear.  
  
For once, he took someone else’s advice, letting the stroke of her hand through his hair and the slight release from pain and withdrawal ease him into a bit of sleep. He knew it wouldn’t last, but it was something.   
  
****


End file.
